In general, a hermetic compressor is employed in a refrigeration cycle of a refrigerator, air conditioner, etc., to compress a refrigerant. The hermetic compressor includes a hermetic container defining an external appearance thereof. The hermetic container includes, at opposite sides thereof, a suction pipe to guide a refrigerant, which has passed through an evaporator of the refrigeration cycle, into the hermetic container, and a discharge pipe to guide the refrigerant, compressed within the hermetic container, to a condenser of the refrigeration cycle outside of the hermetic container.
The hermetic container includes a drive unit to provide a drive force for compression of the refrigerant, and a compression unit to compress the refrigerant upon receiving the drive force of the drive unit. Both the drive unit and the compression unit are installed, via a frame, in the hermetic container.
The compression unit includes a cylinder provided at one side of the frame. The cylinder has a compression chamber, a piston to rectilinearly reciprocate in the compression chamber via the drive force of the drive unit, and a cylinder head coupled to the cylinder so as to hermetically seal the compression chamber, the cylinder head having a refrigerant suction chamber and a refrigerant discharge chamber which are separated from each other. A valve device is typically interposed between the cylinder and the cylinder head to control the flow of refrigerant to be suctioned from the refrigerant suction chamber into the compression chamber or to be discharged from the compression chamber into the refrigerant discharge chamber. The refrigerant suction chamber is connected to the suction pipe, and the refrigerant discharge chamber is connected to the discharge pipe.
With the above-described configuration, when the piston rectilinearly reciprocates in the compression chamber via operation of the drive unit, a pressure difference occurs between the interior and the exterior of the compression chamber, causing the refrigerant, guided into the hermetic container along the suction pipe, to be introduced into the refrigerant suction chamber, and subsequently, to be suctioned into and compressed in the compression chamber. The compressed refrigerant is discharged from the compression chamber to the outside of the hermetic container through the refrigerant discharge chamber and the discharge pipe. As this operation is repeatedly carried out, the compressor carries out compression of the refrigerant.
In addition, the hermetic compressor includes a damping discharge chamber to reduce pressure pulsation of the refrigerant having passed through the refrigerant discharge chamber, so as to reduce pulsation noise of the refrigerant. The damping discharge chamber defines a predetermined expansion space. Accordingly, the discharge pipe guides the refrigerant, which is reduced in noise while passing through the damping discharge chamber, to the outside of the hermetic container.
FIG. 1 illustrates a prior art damping discharge chamber 1 provided in a hermetic compressor. As shown in FIG. 1, the damping discharge chamber 1 includes a chamber space 2a formed in a frame 2 to have an open end, and a cover 3 coupled to the frame 2 to cover the open end of the chamber space 2a. The refrigerant discharge chamber (not shown) is connected to the damping discharge chamber 1 via a discharge guide path 2b formed in the frame 2. An entrance end of a discharge pipe 4 is connected to the cover 3.
The refrigerant, having passed through the refrigerant discharge chamber is guided into the damping discharge chamber 1 through the discharge guide path 2b. The refrigerant is diffused in the damping discharge chamber 1, whereby the refrigerant, having reduced pulsation noise, is discharged to outside of the hermetic container via the discharge pipe 4.
When the discharge guide path 2b is long, a flow distance of the refrigerant increases. It is thus possible, for example, to intercept a high-order frequency in pulsation of the refrigerant, resulting in more efficient reduction of refrigerant pulsation.
Accordingly, in recent years, an effort to maximize the length of the discharge guide path 2b formed in the frame 2 has been made. However, due to the fact that the frame 2 is conventionally formed by casting and has a high strength, forming the discharge guide path 2b of the frame 2 requires a difficult operation to provide a hole in the high-strength frame 2. Therefore, lengthening the discharge guide path 2b of the frame 2 of the prior art hermetic compressor is difficult.